I'm Fairly Often Just Completely Happy

DOUGLAS: Oh well, come on, no one's truly happy.

ARTHUR: I'm truly happy!

MARTIN: Oh God.

DOUGLAS: No, Arthur, you are cheery. No one's interested in the secret of true cheeriness.

ARTHUR: No, that's not true. I'm fairly often just completely happy. Like, for instance, when you get into a bath quickly and it's just the right temperature, and you go "ooooh". I mean, no one really gets any happier than that.

MARTIN: What a depressing thought.

ARTHUR: No, no, it's not though! Because those sort of things happen all the time, whereas you're hardly ever, you know, blissfully happy with the love of your life in the moonlight, and when you are, you're too busy worrying about it being over soon, whereas the bath moments, there's loads of those!

***

I'm no Arthur Shappey.

But isn't he adorable? (Source)

Lately, I've been carrying a deep sadness around with me, what with varsity stress and breaking up with my crazy-haired man and the endless rain and my directionless dissertation and the creeping knowledge that my time here is running out. It springs out at me late at night and when I wake up in the mornings, and, for that matter, any time I think about one of the things I've just listed. Especially leaving. I've never been at all good at living in the moment, but I decided when I moved here that I was going to have to try, or I'd spend my whole wonderful, exciting year of adventures and awesome people agonising over how soon it was going to end.

The closer that end gets, the harder it is to ignore.

So, inspired by Chase That Happy, I made a list of the things that make me happy. All simple, practical things that I can do that help me fight the sad.

Chase That Happy!

WATCH
Horrible Histories
Happy Endings
Arrested Development
The Middleman

LISTEN
Cabin Pressure
Bleak Expectations
Harry Potter

READ 
Hark, a Vagrant

DO
Go outside
Exercise
Do a silly dance
Draw silly pictures in Paint
Write silly fic
Decorate hair
Sing
Uke
Bake
Play games with friends
Learn Latin/Old English/Ancient Greek
Pretend to be a pirate

It's a work in progress. (I don't have a bathtub, or Arthur's "ooooh" moment would definitely be on the list.)

Since the library's closed on Sundays, I had a totally self-indulgent day today which included nine of the things on the list. And as I was taking my bike to the shop for repairs, I had one of those Arthur moments in which I was completely happy. And it wasn't because everything in my life was suddenly going perfectly - it was just because I was out for a walk in the sun on a day when I'd given myself permission not to work. Much more hot-bath than love-of-my-life-in-the-moonlight.

I nearly cried* about ten minutes later when I found out that my lovely Luna is more or less a write off because her gears and back wheel are so damaged. But I came home and I baked, and watched Horrible Histories, and played Guillotine and Racing Demons with Bri, and I found the happy again. Sometimes I find it because everything in my life is going amazingly well, and sometimes I find it in the cracks in between, where the little things are.

I'm very much not an Arthur, but things are ok. I really am fairly often just completely happy. The sad is there, but it doesn't always win.

Suck it, sad.

*Ok, I did cry, but not in front of the mechanic. I have my pride.